Man and the Old Testament Scriptures

We'll take your Bible and turn back with me to Matthew chapter 5. Matthew chapter 5. This morning we will be in verse 19 like I said earlier. Now we spent two messages already in verses 17 to 18 and that really sets us up for the application. Whether you know it or not, the application is found in verse 19 and 20. Jesus just preaches a sermon there in verses 17 to 18. And now we're going to get into the application and I'm excited to see how this really all just unfolds for us. Now if we revisit our minds verses 7 to 18, we have seen how Jesus related to the Old Testament scriptures.

Jesus plainly stated there in those verses that he had not come to alter or do away with or to destroy the Old Testament scriptures. On the contrary, Jesus exalted the Old Testament scriptures to their proper place. Did he not? In verses 7 to 18, Jesus simply did three things. He elevated the scriptures, he emphasized the Old Testament scriptures, and then he explained them. Jesus elevated the scriptures as being from God. They were affirmed by the prophets. He emphasized that every word, every letter, every stroke of God's word is eternal. They're permanent. They will never be done away with.

And then he reached the climax of this teaching when he explained that he had come to fulfill and accomplish everything in the Old Testament scriptures. I know we briefly covered how Christ fulfilled the moral law, the judicial law, and the ceremonial law. Really there's so much that could be said there, and one day we will probably go a lot further in detail with those realities, those truths. But he was able, Christ was able to fulfill and accomplish all, not just because of his righteous behavior, but because he was in his very being righteousness. But right here I want to emphasize one important truth.

In a way, there is only one sense in which Jesus fulfilled the law. He fulfilled and accomplished everything the Old Testament scriptures said by dying on the cross and satisfying the righteous demands of all of the law against those who would believe and be saved. Christ dying on the cross to fulfill and accomplish the law was the ultimate purpose in his coming. And in so doing, he canceled the claims the law has against those who would believe. Therefore, those who were born again, true Christians, they receive his righteousness and are righteous before God. Simply his ultimate purpose was to redeem man.

And Jesus did that by fulfilling everything and accomplishing everything there in the Old Testament law. Now all of that leads us right up to a question. This is a very important question. This really starts us off properly with the message this morning. How does the true Christian relate to the Old Testament law? Now remember the title of the messages from verses 17 and 18. It was how Jesus related to the Old Testament scriptures. But we must ask ourselves, how do we as true Christians relate to the Old Testament law of God? If as a true Christian we are under grace and we are, then how do we relate to the law of God?

Some say in grace we are completely disconnected from the Old Testament law. Others say that we are totally bound up in the law in every way. And this is a very serious question because if we do not answer this question properly, we can get into one of two errors. And those errors can be very, very detrimental. Well starting in verse 19, Jesus begins to answer that question for us. And we're going to look at verse 19 in three ways. Now these truths or observations are rather lengthy. We're going to look at what I'm calling our connection to the Old Testament law.

And we're going to look at the ramifications of keeping the Old Testament law and then an explanation to keeping the Old Testament law. Really you can abbreviate those. You can call them our connection, the ramifications, and a clarification. Again this all goes into or comes out of verse 19. Now as always I do encourage you to take notes. I'm going to give us quite a few scripture references all throughout the message. Write those down. And as a part of being a good student, go back into your notes and study the scriptures. Maybe read the other verses that I reference.

And if you do that in prayer, the Lord will really take what we're looking at and studying this morning and form it into your mind. And as I always say, you're always welcome to my notes. And I'll be glad to sit down with you and help you with anything that we look at. Because we want to see all of us get what the Lord wants to teach us this morning. So let's start off in our message. In our first observation, number one, this is what I'm calling our connection to the Old Testament law. Our connection to the Old Testament law. Now we know that verses 17 to 18 were all about Christ and His relationship to the Old Testament law.

We see Jesus use personal pronouns like I often in the verses. That's why I titled the verses Jesus and the Old Testament scriptures. We had a part one and a part two. But now in verse 19 we have a transition. The word therefore is a key word. Now I'm reading from the English Standard Version. "Therefore whoever..." Now the New American uses the term "whosoever then." But notice that transition. "Therefore whoever..." or "whoever then." Jesus is shifting His focus here from how He relates to the Old Testament to how man relates to the Old Testament. Look at the verse, verse 19. And notice how things shift.

"Therefore whoever relaxes one of these, the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, He will be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whoever does them and teaches them, they will be called great." I think you see that shift. So what are we seeing here just in this simple observation? This is short. This is brief. But we need to see the definite connection between man and the Old Testament scriptures. The Old Testament scriptures are not simply religious ideas or even a self-help manual. The Old Testament is not only a history of the nation of Israel and how God worked through them.

The Old Testament scriptures are the very words of God which Jesus exalted as from God. And He affirmed them by mentioning the fact that the prophets affirmed them. And they are permanent. They are eternal. And here Jesus is connecting man to those Old Testament scriptures as well. I ran across a little quotation from the Bible commentator William Barclay that will help us here. And I'll read it and then I'll expand on it. And I think you'll understand what I'm sharing with you here, this connection to the Old Testament law.

And I'm quoting, "He," that's Jesus, "He was saying that there is a definite continuation between the past and the present." What is he saying? The Old Testament, the past and the present when He has come. And I'm quoting, "We must never look on life as kind of a battle between the past and the present." Now let me pause there. Some do that. Some battle between the Old and the New Testament. And I'm continuing with the quote, "The present grows out of the past." And that's what we're going to see. The present, the New Testament, the work of Christ grows out of the past. And now for us, we must see that reality.

The New Testament is a continuation of the Old. The New Testament is connected to the Old. Jesus came to fulfill and accomplish the Old Testament. And the New Testament is a story of that work. And for us, we are connected to both the Old and the New. We are connected to this complete story, the story of the Old Testament and the New. The Old Testament is relevant to us today. And there are ramifications as to how we relate to the Old Testament, really all of the Word of God. And we'll get into those ramifications here in a moment. But you know, to continue with a little application, I thought about a phrase that we might be familiar with.

See, as Baptists, we've always said stuff like this, "You know, we're people of the Book." I'm holding up the Book, the Word of God. You would agree with that. We're people of the Book. But we're people of the Book, the whole thing, the Old and the New Testament. See, the problem with the Jews was in that day, they said they were people of the Book, but really they were far from people of the Book. So what are we seeing? Our first observation. This really just sets us up for the verse. Our connection to the Old Testament Scriptures. And then second, notice the ramifications of keeping the Old Testament law. Go back to the Scripture.

"Therefore," see, there's the connection, "whoever," he's talking to the men, the disciples, and this applies to us. "Therefore, whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven." Now here Jesus moves from connecting man to the Old Testament Scriptures to explaining the ramifications of that connection. But to me, we see a connection. And really, there's an implied responsibility.

Without saying it, really in an outright manner, Jesus is saying that man is connected and responsible. He's responsible to the Old Testament. And there are consequences for how man deals with this responsibility. Now these two consequences, ramifications, they're listed there in the verse, verse 19. They really are easy for us to see. We have negative consequences and then we have positive consequences. Look back at the verse. "Therefore, whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same, they will be called least in the kingdom of heaven." There's the negative.

"But whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven." There's the positive. So I want us to take the time and examine the negative and the positive here. So first, let's examine this negative consequence. Jesus starts off in explaining this negative consequence with a key word. The English standard uses the word relax or relaxes. The New American uses a word called a nulls. I like the King James. The King James uses the word breaks. Now this is a common word found all throughout the New Testament and it really has an obvious meaning. It means to break. It means to release or to make invalid.

What Jesus is teaching here is obvious. The idea here is of breaking or dissolving or making God's law invalid. The idea here is releasing man from the requirements of the Old Testament scripture. Now I've already said, I've already explained that the Jews, remember, they comprise most of the crowd there. The Jews in that day had thousands and thousands of rules and regulations and those rules and regulations and traditions were meant to ensure that they kept the law of God. But those rules, those regulations, all of those traditions did not have the desired effect.

Instead, they elevated their law and their traditions above and beyond God's law. But the Jews had done something else as well. They had made another fatal error. Scholars tell us that the religious leaders had divided the Old Testament into two categories. They had a category of positive commandments and then they had a category of negative commandments. The religious leaders in that day would have all of these contentious debates about which category was the most important. But that was a problem. Jesus never did that. That was a man-made way of approaching the Old Testament scriptures.

Now I give you a couple of examples that'll help us see how Jesus approached the Old Testament scriptures. There was a day when a young Pharisee, that would have been a religious leader, he came to Jesus and he asked which commandment was the greatest? That happened in Matthew chapter 22. Jesus goes on to say, starting in verse 37, on down to verse 40, "You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind." This is the great and the first commandment. What is he saying? The number one, love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and mind.

And then verse 39, "And the second is like it, you shall love your neighbor as yourself." And oh, verse 40 is key. On these two commandments depends all of the law and all of the prophets. Now what's the point? Simply Jesus is giving the greatest commandment and then the second greatest commandment and then he says everything else falls under these two. Another example, the great woe statements in chapter 23 of Matthew's gospel. There Jesus pronounces these great judgments on the religious leaders for ignoring and doing away with the Old Testament scriptures for relaxing and breaking the original meaning of the law with what?

With their rules and regulations and their traditions. In verse 23, Jesus said, "Woe to you." Oh, that was a very harsh statement. It was a pronouncement of judgment and damnation. He says, "Woe to you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, Utah have meant, for Utah have meant and deal in Cumin and have neglected the weightier matters of the law, justice and mercy and faithfulness. These you ought to have done without neglecting the others." So in summary, what is Jesus saying? It is not acceptable in any way to relax or change or do away with the Old Testament law. And see, that's what the Pharisees were doing.

They were holding on to these little rules and traditions and they were ignoring the weightier things of justice and mercy and faithfulness. And in no way should his law be altered or dismissed. And yes, some of the Old Testament scriptural commands are greater than others, but none should be altered or ignored or annulled in any, any way. But there's more. Jesus gives more. He moves from the one who relaxes or annulls or does away with the Old Testament scripture, "Oh, to the one who leads others the same in the same error." Go back to the verse.

"Therefore, whoever relaxes, annuls, I like the King James, breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same, will be called least in the kingdom of heaven." Jesus says, "The one who leads others to relax or annul the scriptures, they're worse." This person first disregards and destroys the Old Testament scripture in their life. And then second, they lead others to do the same thing. I thought about this phrase, "This is the blind leading the blind." Really worse, this is the one in error, leading others into their error. Now, a question. What are the ramifications? What are the consequences for this error?

We see in the verse denying and disobeying any of God's word and leading others to do the same. Listen, it says, "They will be least in the kingdom of heaven." Now, what does this mean? Look at the verse, verse 19. What does it say? "They will be least or called least in the kingdom of heaven." Now, there are a couple of misunderstandings here. This does not mean that the one committing this error is lost or even that they would lose their salvation. That's an error. This does not have anything to do with what man says about them, what mankind would say. This only pertains to their place in heaven.

Jesus is saying that those who hold the word of God to a low standard will be relegated to a lower place in heaven. Remember who he's talking to. Yes, the Jews, they were in the crowd. They were making all of these grievous mistakes with their rules and regulations and traditions. But he is especially talking to those disciples, his chosen ones. I've said all along that this was really like their ordination service. Well, this is a part of what Christ is commissioning in the disciples. Jesus is warning them and others that follow in their footsteps to be very, very careful not to lower the standard of any part of God's word. Don't relax it.

Don't destroy it. And don't lead others to do the very same thing. You know, if you think about it, the Bible is full of examples and warnings about this mistake. They're all in the Scriptures. The Bible is full of warnings against those who have made this mistake. Paul was constantly warning the church to be on guard against those who would do what? Alter the teaching of the Scriptures. In Galatians 1, verse 8, Paul says that if anyone, even an angel from heaven should alter the gospel message, let them be eternally condemned.

In Acts chapter 20, Paul is warning the Ephesian church elders to be on guard from those who would rise up even from among them and that they would pervert the things that he taught. Even James said in his epistle that not many should presume to become teachers. Why? Because they will become, they will be held to a stricter judgment, a stricter standard. Well, that's the negative. That's the negative consequence of relaxing or even destroying the word of God being relegated to least in the kingdom. But now let's examine the second ramification or consequence, the positive consequence. We see this in the verse. Let's go back to the verse.

"Therefore, whoever relaxes or breaks one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven." There's the negative. "But whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven." Now again, Jesus brings out two things which are going on. The living out and the leading of others. We see that living out of the doing and then the leading and teaching others. So we see the living and the leading, the living and the teaching. Earlier we saw living and leading in error.

But here we see the positive, the one who lives all of God's word, all of God's law properly. And then they lead and they teach others to live God's word and God's law property. They live it and then they lead others as well. Now notice their consequence. Jesus says they will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. Oh, I like how John MacArthur describes this greatness. I'm going to borrow his quote and then I'm going to add to it because I think there's another layer. And I'm quoting greatness, this greatness here. Greatness is not determined by gifts, success, popularity, reputation, or size of ministry. Let me pause there.

That should let all of us off the hook. It's not about being a big shot. Let me go back to his quote. Greatness is not determined by gifts, success, popularity, reputation, or size of ministry. But I'm continuing with the quote. But by a believer's view of scripture as revealed in his life and teaching. And I'll add one word to that. Obedience. Oh, listen, you're obedient to who God's called you to be with your gifts and your abilities and your talents and your opportunities. You are obedient. Now here's where I want to dispel a terrible misconception.

This does not only apply to the greats like Paul and Peter in the Old Testament sakes like Abraham and Moses. See, that's what we can do. Oh, I'm not like them. So that doesn't apply to me. No, this promise applies to any and all true believers who faithfully do two things. Live all of God's word and then lead others to do the same. All of it. And if you do that, what is Jesus saying? You'll be great. You'll be great in the kingdom of heaven. Now let's move to the third observation that I want us to see. I'm calling this an explanation to keeping the Old Testament law. I'm calling this an explanation to keeping the Old Testament law.

Now, the ceremonial and the judicial were fulfilled in Christ and then those were set aside at the cross. Now we see that reality really all throughout the New Testament scriptures. What it's focused on is keeping the moral law never in the New Testament, the ceremonial or the judicial. And we will see that standard explained in the rest of the Sermon on the Mount. Really, I can't wait to get there. But here I want to address really what can be confusing for some. This is why I'm calling this third major truth an explanation to keeping the Old Testament law. Now here's the confusion.

In some New Testament scriptures, we see that we are free from the law. Isn't that what we just saw earlier? We see that we are free from the law. But in others, we see that we are bound to the law. Now this can be hard for some. Some get into error here too. Some go to the left or to the right a little too far. Now this is a paradox or a seeming contradiction. On one side of the coin, the New Testament tells us that the law is fulfilled in Christ and then it is put aside. But at times, the New Testament tells us that we are still expected to obey the law. We see this in Paul's writings very often.

And I want to quickly explain this seeming contradiction. And this will be brief. And I believe this will help with any confusion. And this will be some clarification. And again, if I reference some scripture, you write that down. And as always, you're welcome to come for further teaching one-on-one time if you need some help here. But first, I want to remind you of how Christ related to the ceremonial law. Now this portion of the Old Testament scriptures came to an end at the cross. When Jesus died on the cross, Mark 1538 tells us that the veil of the temple was torn or ripped from top to bottom.

Everything associated with temple worship was no longer valid. The entire sacrificial system was set aside. It was no longer needed. Now think about this. Christ was the true Passover lamb and he fulfilled everything in the ceremonial law. The ceremonial law pointed to Christ and when he came and died on the cross, well, it was fulfilled. It was accomplished. So the ceremonial law was fulfilled and accomplished and set aside on the cross. And then second, the judicial law. The judicial law pertained to the nation of Israel. And these were laws that only applied to the nation of Israel.

But when Israel rejected Christ as the Messiah, they were judged by God. And eventually, they were destroyed as a nation by Rome. And they ceased to exist as a nation. And therefore, all of the judicial law was set aside as they were destroyed. But then third, this moral law. We understand that as the Ten Commandments found in Exodus 20. The moral law. Here is where the confusion can come. There is a sense in which God's moral law is not binding on true believers. Romans 6 14 Paul says that we are not under the law, but we are under grace. But in Romans 15, he asks a question. Shall we sin just because we are not under law, but under grace.

He goes on to say never, never shall we sin in that way. Simply Paul is saying that as true believers, we are in Christ, Galatians 2 20. And we are no longer under the penalty of the law. But true believers are not free from the righteous requirements as seen in the moral law. And listen, that my friend is what Jesus will begin to address starting in verse 21. Now I want to go a little further with this explanation. Again, I'm trying to help you with any confusion and I believe this helps. In Romans 10 4 Paul said that Christ is the end of the law for the righteousness to all believers.

In Galatians 5 18 Paul said that if we are led by the spirit, then we are not under the law. But earlier he said in Galatians 5 17 that all true believers are free from God's moral standards. Now question what's happening here. Again, I'm going to give you a quotation from John MacArthur. He just explains it well. And again, I'll add to this and I'll stop along the way and explain what he's trying to teach us. And I'm quoting the law, the Old Testament moral law that was once our tutor, our schoolmaster, to lead us to Christ. Galatians 3 24. What is John MacArthur saying? The Old Testament law showed us our need and it brought us to Christ.

Now it leads us as sons of God through Christ Jesus to be clothed with Christ and his clothing is the clothing of practical righteousness. I like that term practical righteousness. And I'm continuing with a quote. If Christ's own righteousness never diminished or disobeyed God's moral law, how can his disciples be free to do so? We never can be. Grace is not a license to sin. No, we are not under the penalty of the law, but we are under the righteous demands of the law and we do this in Christ. Again, I like what he says. If Christ's own righteousness never diminished or disobeyed God's moral law, how can his disciples be free to do so?

Now, what am I trying to show us here? What is all of this? You might say, pastor, it would really help if you would simplify it for me. The all testament moral law reveals sin. It reveals sin because it is perfect. It is the moral God, the standard. Romans 7, 8 says that it provokes sin. It reveals sin. When man gets next to it, it shows us his utter sinfulness. The all testament moral law enables us to see our own sin and our weakness apart from Christ. It helps us to see truly who we are outside of Christ.

When we are, when we as true believers look into God's moral law as we should, with submission to Christ and a real desire to live a righteous life, it reveals to us more and more our need of Christ and his grace. Simply, as true believers, we are not under the law, but under the grace that we can only find in Christ. But we are bound to the law and God's righteous standards that are found in the law. So if Christ's righteousness never diminished or never destroyed the all testament law, then as true believers, we should never seek to do that as well.

In Christ, true believers are able to keep the all testament moral law only because Christ did it first. Simply, it is only in Christ and only in grace that we are drawn to do so and we are able to do so. Now let's step back from what I'm calling the body of the message. What we see in verse 19, there's really a lot here. We see our connection to the all testament scripture. We are clearly connected to the old and the new. Yes, that moral law, the civil, the judicial is found in Christ, but the moral, it is permanent. But then we looked at the ramifications. There are negative and positive consequences to how we relate to the scriptures.

And then there's this explanation. We are bound to the law, the righteous standards found in the law, only by grace. Now I want to conclude by making my application here. There is a part of the message I understand that is educational. There is a part that is educational and it is good. And we must see two facts. First, that we are bound to the all testament scriptures. And then we must see second what that looks like. Now here, this is the part of the message that really has more of a tremendous bearing on us all more than you know. We must see two words and application coming right out of verse 19.

The first word is doing and the second word is teaching. You can substitute teaching with leading. We must look at doing and we must look at teaching or leading. Go back to the verse. Therefore, whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same, he will be called least in the kingdom of heaven. But whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom. First, we need to ask ourselves the question, how are we doing in the doing? How are we doing in the doing? Are we are we relaxing any part of God's word? Are we annulling any part of God's word?

Are we disregarding therefore destroying any part of the scriptures? See, that was a great mistake that Jews were making. I've seen people do this in the life of the church when they have a segmented life. They have a church life and they have a work life. They have a family life and then they have a hobby life. What do they have? Different standards. What are they doing? They're saying they're upholding all of God's word and they may say that in word and church life, but yet in their work life and hobby life and family life, what do they do? They diminish and ultimately destroy it.

I thought about two examples that go all the way back to my years before I was into the ministry. I'll never forget as we were seeking to try to live for the Lord in every area of our life. I'll never forget I was involved in a particular business and there was a man that came around that we began to witness to and later on he came to faith in Christ and he will tell you that the beginnings of God dealing with him about his salvation was when I was in the workplace and I was simply living out God's word. I wasn't diminishing it. I wasn't disregarding it. I wasn't expelling it.

I was living out God's word at the church house and in my work life. I'll never forget we were ministering to a young man in our church. One Saturday a group of us guys were going deer hunting and we took a guy with us and you know he was blown away and later he literally said after he came to faith in Christ, you guys live for Jesus at the deer camp just like you did at church. See we weren't diminishing or nullifying or ignoring any part of God's word in any area of our life. Were we perfect? No and we never will be perfect. So my question is this, how are you doing?

Because if you're not careful you can say that you're living God's word and you might do it in certain areas of your life but yet you diminish it and you ignore it and what happens is really and truly you segment your life and you become hypocritical. You know I'm sad to say there have been quite a few people who have come in and out of the life of the church and many of them have come face to face with God's word and they refuse to obey it.

They refuse to adjust their life and although they would profess to be Christian and although they went on to be involved in other churches, we watched them systematically come in contact with certain scriptures and certain teaching and after a personal one-on-one counseling and teaching they chose to ignore and in my eyes they were relaxing and annulling and destroying certain portions of scripture and many times what they were doing was fashioning their own form of Christianity. That's what the Jews did. Well look at that more next week and my question for you ma'am or sir are you doing? Are you living out? Not just in word but indeed?

Or are you relaxing or annulling or just destroying without even knowing it certain portions of scripture in certain areas of your life? And then second we must ask ourselves a question how are we doing in the leading? You might say pastor I'm not a teacher I never call to be a teacher and I'm never going to be a teacher. If you profess to be a Christian you're leading in teaching somehow you just don't know it. My question is are you leading others to relax or to annul and then ultimately to destroy any portions of scripture?

Let me say this to you if you have a Christianity that you live at church and then it's different at home you're doing that with your own children. If you say you love God and love God's word but yet you have one standard for church and then one standard at home you are leading and teaching your children awry and look they will do just what you're doing if not even more. An old wise friend of mine said something like this what children see their parents do in moderation ultimately they end up doing it in excess. Do you want your children to take how you live and then live out that life in excess?

See what you could be doing is relaxing and annulling and destroying the word of God in your home and then leading your children to do the same thing. You know one of the toughest things to deal with in the life of the church is helping people get over the Christianity that was modeled in their own home. Some of you here you have parents who have modeled an unbiblical Christianity they have taught you and they have led you to relax in annul scripture after scripture and you have a hard time getting over it.

It's really hard to get to the place where you look at your own mother and father and own family and say you are wrong the Bible says you're wrong. Sometimes we have friends people we look up to you hear where I'm going we have to look around us and if we're relaxing and annulling and destroying and look I have seen some children go astray and go awry because moms and dads do this in the home far more than they know. You know there's another layer I've seen ministers go awry and lead others astray. Listen we have to get to the place where we realize true Christians can be led astray by ministers who are awry in this area.

That was the problem with the Galatian church. If you ever want to read a letter where Paul really appeared to be angry and he was angry because there were real Christians in the life of the church and there was a little group who had come along and they had added to the scripture therefore their leading and their teaching was awry and what was happening God's people were being led astray and I have seen people be led astray by ministers who do the very same thing. They relax they annul and then ultimately they destroy portions of God's scripture and what happens true Christians suffer.

Now I think you see the title of the message man in the Old Testament scripture. Really we must see where we are in the scheme of things here the timeline. I'll call your attention to the context where are we here in the verses. Verse one says that Jesus had the great crowds there. I've said over and over and over we've got mostly Jews. There's a smattering of Gentiles maybe in the peripheral or in the back there's those disciples there on the front row and yes he is attacking their legalistic Judaism. He is attacking it with what? He is attacking it with the true Christian life.

This is the extraordinary Christian life true kingdom living and what's going on here. He is explaining to them how he relates to the Old Testament scripture and how they relate to the Old Testament scripture. But where are we? We're on down the line in the timeline of things and so the title of the message really for us should be man and the scriptures how we relate to old and new. And that's why I spent the time to give you that brief explanation as to how we relate to the old and then I'm pointing you to the future because what we must see is this. We are bound to live out the old and the new and the new shows us how we live the old.

So I close out verse 19. I close out with application. Man and the scriptures. How are you living them? How are you living them? And ma'am sir we must see that if we expel them or unknow them or break them and lead others to do so and inevitably we always will there are ramifications. Now I stand here as your pastor and I say this to you. I'm not the most talented. I'm not the smartest. I'm not the most educated. I probably will never preach on the big stage and that's okay. But all I'm responsible for is being faithful and obedient and leading you to do the same.

So this should be a call for us to be back into the scriptures and obey all that the Lord is giving us. Let's pray and then we'll sing a closing few verses and we'll dismiss until we gather back later tonight.